Watch Ludacris bury contestants alive with rats in 'Fear Factor' sneak peek
“Welcome to the cemetery.” It’s a sentence no contestant on MTV’s Fear Factor wants to hear. But, as you can see in our exclusive sneak peek from Sunday’s “Season From Hell” premiere, the situation is even worse than they can imagine.
As host Ludacris explains, during the cholera epidemic of the 1800s, many people were so sick, doctors believed they had died and they were buried. People began purchasing “dead ringer” coffins, so that if they were accidentally buried alive, they could ring a bell to be rescued (hence the origin of the phrase “saved by the bell”).
What’s the Fear Factor version of this? You are buried alive under 200 pounds of dirt with your best friend, some bugs, and a lot of rats. The upside: Not all of the rats are just “looking to snack on panicking best friends,” as Ludacris puts it. Some have tiny poles attached to their tails. The contestants have to find those pieces and assemble them into one large pole that they’ll raise through a hole in the coffin to ring a bell.
Again, to quote Ludacris, “Ringing the bell stops the clock, but it also lets us know to get you the hell out of there.”
Fear Factor: Season From Hell premieres Feb. 25 at 7 p.m. on MTV.